I shopped around looking for the best anvil I could find. I won't even mention all of the brands that I looked at. It doesn't matter now.
I settled on the 77 pound Ridgid/Peddinghaus #5 anvil for a number of reasons. It was not too heavy, it was not too expensive, it was forged steel and I believed that it should be well made. Well, I got it a couple of days ago and was a little taken aback. Now this is the first anvil I have ever owned... or even seen up close, for that matter (other than Harbor Freight). There seem to be some problems here. The face of the anvil looks perfect, no problem there. The anvil rings like a bell wherever it is struck, so I think that there is no problem there but... the finishing is so poor.
In the manufacturers pic, I don't know which model is shown but the horn appears to be unpainted, shiny and smooth. https://www.ridgid.com/us/en/forged-anvils#dvTables
The anvil that I have has a black painted horn which is anything but smooth. It is rather rough, with flat grind lines going from point to base. The anvil appears to have been painted twice. On the horn, it appears that the first coat of paint flaked off or something and it was painted again. On the body of the anvil, the second coat has paint runs going down the side. The interior of both the Hardie and the Pritchel are rusty (perhaps that is normal). The transition between the face and the sides of the anvil is sort of, a 30-45 degree chamfer. Basically the edges have just been knocked off... and not very uniformly.
I really expected better finishing for the price. Perhaps I was just expecting too much. The incredibly sloppy two-coat paint job just does not seem like anything that would come from Germany.
BTW, this anvil is a 69622 part number. It has a 1" Hardie, a 3/4" Pritchel and a 4" wide face. I ran across many inaccuracies on various websites about these stats. If you look at the Ridgid website listed above, it says that only the model 9 and 12 have a Pritchel and they list the face width of the model 5 as being 3" when, in fact, it is 4".
There seems to have been a previous model designated 68622, which may have been different. Maybe it did not have a Pritchel... maybe it was manufactured somewhere else. Maybe it had a shiny horn and good black paint. I don't know.
What is going on here? Am I just expecting too much? Did I get a refurb, or what? I know that I shouldn't worry too much about esthetics on an anvil but it makes me question the origin and quality of what I bought. Thanks for any help or clarity that you may be able to bring to my situation.
Nick
I settled on the 77 pound Ridgid/Peddinghaus #5 anvil for a number of reasons. It was not too heavy, it was not too expensive, it was forged steel and I believed that it should be well made. Well, I got it a couple of days ago and was a little taken aback. Now this is the first anvil I have ever owned... or even seen up close, for that matter (other than Harbor Freight). There seem to be some problems here. The face of the anvil looks perfect, no problem there. The anvil rings like a bell wherever it is struck, so I think that there is no problem there but... the finishing is so poor.
In the manufacturers pic, I don't know which model is shown but the horn appears to be unpainted, shiny and smooth. https://www.ridgid.com/us/en/forged-anvils#dvTables
The anvil that I have has a black painted horn which is anything but smooth. It is rather rough, with flat grind lines going from point to base. The anvil appears to have been painted twice. On the horn, it appears that the first coat of paint flaked off or something and it was painted again. On the body of the anvil, the second coat has paint runs going down the side. The interior of both the Hardie and the Pritchel are rusty (perhaps that is normal). The transition between the face and the sides of the anvil is sort of, a 30-45 degree chamfer. Basically the edges have just been knocked off... and not very uniformly.
I really expected better finishing for the price. Perhaps I was just expecting too much. The incredibly sloppy two-coat paint job just does not seem like anything that would come from Germany.
BTW, this anvil is a 69622 part number. It has a 1" Hardie, a 3/4" Pritchel and a 4" wide face. I ran across many inaccuracies on various websites about these stats. If you look at the Ridgid website listed above, it says that only the model 9 and 12 have a Pritchel and they list the face width of the model 5 as being 3" when, in fact, it is 4".
There seems to have been a previous model designated 68622, which may have been different. Maybe it did not have a Pritchel... maybe it was manufactured somewhere else. Maybe it had a shiny horn and good black paint. I don't know.
What is going on here? Am I just expecting too much? Did I get a refurb, or what? I know that I shouldn't worry too much about esthetics on an anvil but it makes me question the origin and quality of what I bought. Thanks for any help or clarity that you may be able to bring to my situation.
Nick
